Polish leader Walesa plans visit to...

WEST LAFAYETTE

March 29, 2006

WEST LAFAYETTEPolish leader Walesa plans visit to Purdue Nobel Peace Prize winner Lech Walesa is to visit Purdue University for a public speech next week. Walesa, the founder of Solidarity who later became Poland's president, will speak at 7 p.m. April 6 at the school's Stewart Center as part of the Purdue Series on Corporate Citizenship and Ethics. Walesa won the 1983 Noble Peace Prize after he organized the 1980 Gdansk shipyard strike that culminated with the communist regime making unprecedented concessions to the workers, including allowing the Soviet bloc's first free trade union. Solidarity suffered setbacks after martial law was declared in December 1981, but it went on to negotiate a peaceful end to communism in Poland in 1989, which in turn helped hasten the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Walesa, a former shipyard electrician, was imprisoned during martial law in the early 1980s but went on to serve as Poland's president during 1990-1995. He now heads the Lech Walesa Institute, which aims to advance democracy and free-market reform throughout Eastern Europe and the rest of the world. LAKE STATIONBody in river that of missing Gary man A body that fishermen found in northwestern Indiana's Deep River is that of a 22-year-old Gary man missing since February, police said. An autopsy did not show signs of trauma to the body of Hector Fontanez Jr., Lake Station Police Chief Mike Stills said. Investigators are waiting for toxicology test results for a better indication of what might have happened to Fontanez, who was reported missing Feb. 7, he said. Stills said they aren't ruling out foul play in the death. Police are hoping Fontanez's former girlfriend may have information that could help solve the case. He said the couple had problems before Fontanez disappeared, and his family said he was depressed. Dustin Ingram and Steve Pundrich, who were in a fishing boat, first spotted the body when they saw a shoe protruding from the water Saturday. This is the second body Lake Station police have pulled from the river in the last year. INDIANAPOLISMan accused of killing son found dead in cell A man charged with murder in the death of his infant son committed suicide in jail early Tuesday morning before a court appearance scheduled for later in the day, Marion County authorities said. Capt. Phil Burton said jail officers found Walter Stegman, 24, hanging by a bedsheet in his Marion County jail cell about 1:30 a.m. Tuesday morning. Prosecutors officially charged Stegman on March 23 with murder, neglect and battery in the death of 3-month-old Andrew C. Stegman. He was scheduled to go to court Tuesday. "It's unfortunate because we did not have any signs," Burton said. "We had no prior indication of any suicidal thoughts with this particular individual." Burton said a judge had ordered that Stegman be kept alone in a cell. He was last seen alive when officers made their rounds at 1 a.m., and inmates in neighboring cells heard nothing unusual, Burton said.